A few minutes later he threw open the great doors of the hall, and the party stared silently at the scene before them. The full moon swung close to the ice-fields, the white harsh peaks high above. In the court-yard, on the small plain beyond, on every snowy hill and rock, were crowded hundreds of men clad in the skins of the sheep, the wolf, the goat, and the bear. On their heads were high fur hats, which exposed but a fringe of long hair on their shoulders and concealed their brows, giving them an aspect of singular wildness. But they were very quiet, almost breathless, until Zrinyi stepped forward and shouted something in Roumanian. Then each man lifted a flute to his lips, and a sweet and savage melody stole forth gently, to rise and swell until all the vast and desolate scene seemed to bend and listen. The notes might have been born of the peaks that looked as if torn asunder by harsh unlovely hands, then softened to beauty and gentleness by the silver glitter of the snow. And the strains, piercing yet remote, had in them too the eternal loneliness of the mountains, the only thing in Nature akin to the eternal loneliness of the great. The hills took up the echo and rolled it on, and among far and hidden peaks a laugh seemed flying from itself. When they had finished, Zrinyi turned to Ranata. “They have come here to see your Royal Highness,” he said; “and not so much because you are our princess as the sister of our lost crown prince. Have I your permission to ask them to enter?” Ranata, who was pale, turned paler. “Yes,” she said. “Ask them in.” The guests returned to the lower end of the hall, whence the table had been removed, and threw off their cloaks. The women made a brilliant group in their elaborate dinner dress, their flowers and jewels and superfluous fans. The Wallachians and Roumanians--there are few of Hungarian blood so far south in Transylvania--came silently but eagerly in. Each man as he entered removed the tower of fur on his head, revealing a dark mane of matted hair. The countenances thus exposed were mild and often handsome, but the dark eyes burned and flashed with an excitement of which they gave no other evidence. Ranata remained with the group until the incoming throng had almost filled the hall. The doors were still open, and behind the mass of heads on the platform she could see the snowy slopes of the range, whose silences seemed to have fallen upon the castle; no one spoke, and the sandals of the mountaineers pressed the floor silently. Zrinyi murmured a suggestion, and Ranata ascended a few steps of the staircase which finished the hall. All the voluptuous beauty had left her face; it was so white that her eyes burned black. Her aspect would have been angry had it been less stern. She could not speak Roumanian, but Zrinyi had hastily taught her a few words. “I am the sister of your crown prince,” she said. “And I am honored and happy that you have come to see me.”